


So Near, So Far

by thisbluespirit



Category: Doctor Who (1963)
Genre: 500 prompts, F/M, Ficlet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-12
Updated: 2018-01-12
Packaged: 2019-03-03 22:03:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 756
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13350423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisbluespirit/pseuds/thisbluespirit
Summary: It's not quite home, not yet.





	So Near, So Far

**Author's Note:**

> Written for livii in the [500 Prompts Meme](http://lost-spook.dreamwidth.org/291842.html): 423 – dancing beneath the moon – Ian/Barbara (DW).

There was only one couple left out on the terrace, illuminated by the overspill of light from the French windows beside it, and the moon above.

“It’s ridiculous, isn’t it?”

Ian raised an eyebrow at Barbara, his partner in the dance. “Actually, I’d just been thinking what a pleasant evening it was – for a change. Just you me, the music, moonlight – no monsters, at least not currently –”

“Yes, of course,” said Barbara, shifting closer. “I don’t mean that. Well, I dread to think what the Doctor and Vicki are up to, but that wasn’t it. Here we are, back on our own planet, probably no more than seventy miles from London – home – and thirty years too early.”

Ian nodded. “A near miss is worse than something that’s entirely wide of the mark?”

“Something like that,” she agreed with a short laugh.

“We could pop in and see our parents, I suppose. Pat our very much younger selves on the head, even.”

Barbara treated him to what he thought of as her best schoolma’am’s look. “Yes, and cause any amount of trouble, I should imagine! I can’t see the Doctor approving, and for once I’d have to agree.”

“Oh, yes, you’re right,” said Ian, but he gave a grin. “It keeps crossing my mind, though.”

“I see I shall have to keep an eye on you.”

His grin grew. “Do, Miss Wright, do.”

That earned him a brief poke in the ribs as he led her idly round in their solitary slow dance. It was a little chilly out on the terrace, which was probably why the last of the other dancers had retreated inside a few minutes ago.

“Do you think he’ll ever get us home?” Barbara asked after a moment, not looking at him. 

He could sympathise entirely with the mixed edge of despair and exasperation in her tone. He made sure he’d caught her gaze before he replied, so that she’d know he wasn’t only trying to placate her – which he wasn’t. He _did_ believe it, for some reason, even if it wasn’t very scientific or rational. “Yes,” he said. “Somehow I do. I don’t know when or how, but we’ll get home. I’m sure of it.”

“And in the meantime, I suppose,” said Barbara, a glint of amusement in her eye, “if we’re going to gatecrash high class parties, we might as well enjoy ourselves?”

“TARDIS travel does have some small compensations.”

Barbara laughed again and he felt her relax in his hold. “True, although given the amount you put away at dinner, I don’t see how you have the nerve to use call it small!”

“That food machine just isn’t the same,” said Ian. “And while it may have technically happened several millennia ago in one sense, for me it was only two hours before that I was racing across an alien moor to try and get that wretched thingummybob to the Doctor before he blew himself up fixing – what was it he called it again?”

“I’m not sure,” Barbara said. “After all, Vicki and I were hardly in a position to worry about future mechanics.”

They exchanged a glance in shared, rueful acknowledgement of what now consisted of a normal day for them since being carried off into space and time by the Doctor.

“And so, as I was saying,” Ian said, “I thought it was a pleasant evening, in contrast to the rest of the day.” A slice of a more idyllic, peaceful life, and Barbara to share it with – his one constant in this wide and dangerous universe in which he now found himself. He liked to think she thought of him in much the same terms.

Barbara smiled up at him. “Yes. Ian,” she added with a certain look that made Ian hopeful that the evening was going to become even more pleasant indeed, when an inevitable scream cut through the night, immediately putting paid to such ideas.

It was followed by several shouts and crashes from inside the house, and then a loud bang, and the lights went off.

“Something tells me,” said Ian, “we’re about to find out exactly what it is that Vicki and the Doctor have been up to while we were enjoying the party. Are you feeling ready to deal with the usual chaos?”

“I shall have to be.” And she would be, he knew. Barbara was equal to just about anything the galaxy could throw at her.

They hurried away to the rescue, leaving the terrace empty of everything but the moonlight.


End file.
